Hebrews 13

The last chapter of what has been a magnificent detailed explanation of how richly Jesus replaces the old Jewish revelation, and there is no going back. Along the way, it draws out revelation, encouragement and warnings for all believers.

The last chapter tries to be a quick list of everything else the author wants to say, but (s)he also can’t resist getting back into the revelatory place of the rest of the letter a few times too.

I describe the author as (s)he particularly because a number have argued that Priscilla fits the bill.

Towards the end the author explicitly says sort of sorry/not sorry for the length of the letter, because while it’s long, there is also so much more that could be said.

The practical reminders are quite beautiful and tender: remember those in prison as if you were there, those mistreated as if you had been hurt, show hospitality to strangers as if they were angels.

That last verse about entertaining angels unawares has goaded me to dig for change in my pocket for vulnerable beggars many times over my life.

The tone is warm and positive after all the sharp warnings in the teaching. Praise Jesus, do good to others and share. The final prayer calls on Jesus the shepherd, not the disciplinarian.

The following verse struck me for some reason. It builds on the fact that Jesus was crucified outside the Jerusalem city wall, not a temple sacrifice. It’s that deep teaching dimension coming into the final salutations:

“Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore. For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.”

V13-14

Our model is of someone outside the institutions of religion. The church serves Jesus, not the other way around. Walk your path of relationship with Jesus, even if you look like a criminal/misfit. This life is really just camping out, waiting for eternity.

I’m very miserable. A big fight with daisy a week or so ago which has been building for some time. She came to dinner, we ignited her anger, and she never wants to see us again as long as she lives.

It’s true that we upset her a lot. That is a phenomenon of her life which she has dealt with by this action.

There’s so much more could and I hope will be said about it though. I feel a unique mixture of pain for my sake and for hers. Quite devastated on both fronts.

I love her, which keeps opening it up for me. But because I love her, I also have to keep closing it down so she has the space. But also I do need, and I believe it’s for for both our sakes, to assure her of my love. Complicated!

Rennie has gone away for a week to his girlfriend’s family in the country. That’s a strange first, particularly at this time, I think we’re all feeling that.

Mounting evidence of me being a professional, financial and personal failure at a time when I’m too old and badly burnt to do anything about it keeps tempting me to self pity and joylessness.

But I refuse to make it about me. So far it has made Kelly and I stronger, and along with the boys the four of us have valued each other.

I wouldn’t be as dramatic as to say I’m outside the city wall sharing Jesus’ disgrace, but I’m determined to walk this unenviable path sharing Jesus’ grace. Humbly asking forgiveness. Feeling others’ pain, doing good, sharing. Praising.

Hebrews 12

The week the queen died. It’s a bit like losing a parent, she’s been such a constant.

The disabled people I support for work are disturbed by it. They all spend a lot of time alone watching free-to-air television. They are at least annoyed by the wall to wall coverage. But two schizophrenic people are genuinely grieving, trapped with the TVs triggering it.

They are sensitive to what an anchor she has been. They feel the loss, and it seems to connect to so much else they have lost.

Internationally the grief seems to be similar, she’s a marker and connector to so much that has passed.

But here in Hebrews 12 we have the reminder that the saints are all there in heaven watching like a crowd at the Olympic Games, cheering us on to run our race unimpeded by sin as God planned: learning from Christ’s love and sacrifice to work tirelessly for God’s kingdom of peace and justice. Rahab and Jepthah are there. Plus the queen, plus mum and dad.

And even if those images were just our memories or just narratives of them, which I don’t believe they merely are. But even if they were, they would still be a powerful encouragement, and comfort in our loss. Our identity, our provenance.

It’s a frame in which to endure hardship, by remembering them, and thinking of it as discipline that strengthened them.

The author returns to the choice Moses presented to the Israelites as they looked over the border of promised land between the mountain of blessings and the mountain of curses. Who will they serve? When everything is going wrong, I might be fooled into thinking I’m on the mountain of curses.

But my hardship for Christ’s name is like the wilderness years. They lead to mount Zion; to blessing not curses. And to reject it would be to reject God’s grace.

Maybe my hardship at the moment involves batting down my feelings of frustration at being stuck being a mere support worker, and my sense of burnout at church. Maybe it’s taking greater care of Kelly and the kids. Maybe there are whole new paths out there that I could be open to. The choices are more about the spirit and the fruit than the specific path.

Great chapter, interesting thoughts. And today I have a day off with Kelly, and a drive to visit our friend Lisa up the coast. Yippee!

Praying for family, and as I have got in the habit before every shift, for wisdom and love.

Hebrews 11

Classic chapter, the heroes of the faith. I’ve been a bit frightened of doing it justice, which is ultimately a silly response. God’s word deserves respect but it deserves engagement more. If you can’t give God praise, give him struggle. Did Psalms teach me nothing?

This is just a great chapter about faith, the hope in something invisible. The eternity that Ecclesiastes said is hard-wired into our hearts, expressing itself as an awe of something not known, but greater:

“All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth.”

“welcomed them from a distance…” A lens for the whole old testament, connecting it to Christ.

Having emphasised devastatingly the disconnect Christ made with the Israelite religious system, now we have this magnificent connection: faith. It’s surely one of the best sweeps through the whole narrative so far.

And of course these people have flaws. Rahab Jephthah, Samson, David. It’s a shock every time to remember that David was a murderer.

I was also interested in his identification of their sense of being strangers. The unnamed ones who were beaten, sawn in two, and lived hard as vagabonds because of their faith.

It’s all setting the stage for huge encouragement. This starts to make it clear that the sharp rebukes the author has been making are not despairing but hopeful. It’s a vision, a spur, to the great lives the listeners could be living.

Thinking about my life, I’m a bit mixed up because I realise the flexibility of the work I’m doing, care work, means I can do so much more in the church community. Is it wrong to want more?

I’d like just a bit more money. Kelly is a bit miserable and would value the option to work a bit less.

Plus I don’t know about the future, when I’m retired, or how much I want to be able to support the kids. Whether I’ll be able to support myself.

It’s all a swirl into which this passage speaks.

Faith is a simplifying principle, and the guidance, the choices, it offers are broad. My feelings from reading this chapter are very positive, if confusing.

I’m nervous this morning too, as I’m returning to support the guy I offended last week, who slammed the door in my face. I hope it’s not too awkward.

I used to joke about the phrase “live by faith”, a bit of schtick where I outrageously took for granted my parent’s supplying my every need while I also berated them for not “living by faith” (“I neither wash up my plate nor my linen, but lo, it is done! Why can they not live as I do?”)

The phrase was coined by God in response to dialogue in habukuk. The prophet challenges God… how dare God use the Babylonian conquest to solve the problem of corrupt priests!

Live by faith, God says.

Maybe the joke’s on me. Hebrews, habukuk, God are saying things could get a lot worse!

But faith helps you feel OK about living like an outcast here on earth.

Hebrews 10

It concludes the teaching about sacrifice, and flicks into talking about the listeners’ response.

It’s the complete demolition of the temple system, the system of law which is but a shadow of the one true sacrifice of Jesus. Big emphasis on not needing repetition. Once for all does it. We have confidence.

It’s interesting to me that the author emphasises their subjective experience of forgiveness as much or more than the cosmic objective issue of sin.

It makes sense when discussing the temple, because actually killing the animal didn’t take away sin. It was only ever a reminder of God’s mercy. A ritual for humans, not essential for God. That’s why it was ongoing like communion. 

Otherwise:

…the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins.

Verse 2

I was just interesting to me that he said “felt” guilty not “been guilty”.

And even with the forgiveness Jesus brings, my subjective experience of it plays a big part:

…let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.

Verse 22

Cleansed from a guilty conscience.

And it’s that confidence before God, the moral ease of being a Christian, the glorious comfort of that subjective realisation of God’s love, that the people who fight Christianity so often miss.

The author arguably goes on straight away to undermine that confidence, when he talks about continuing to sin being like trampling Jesus underfoot, and how much worse it will be for the person who does that than a slack Israelite under the old rules.

But I’m convinced this is designed strongly to inspire the audience. It’s oratorical, stating the case sweepingly and strongly for dramatic performative effect.

He refers to a background of persecution. When they were under attack, they had to be brave and united and take strong stances for their beliefs. But the stunning truth about Jesus should always inspire that response. Confidence should lead to clarity boldness and commitment.

Praying for clarity! There’s so much meat to chew in Hebrews I don’t have much space to relate it, at least in what I write here, to where I am at. But I’m confused, pessimistic and mixed up. Sigh sigh, pray. Confidence, clarity and boldness, yes please!

Hebrews 9

They’ve been talking about ways in which Jesus is better than the old testament revelations of God. He’s a better messenger than the angels. A better leader than Moses, a better advocate for God’s mercy than the priests, and here a better sacrifice than animals.

All interspersed with warnings about falling away, urging us to stick with Jesus.

This is an amazing glimpse into the connections between the Jewish temple system and Jesus. But I know it already, so it’s hard to think what to say other than “wow, yes”. Which isn’t much of a sermon.

I was struck by the discussion of why blood is necessary for covenant promises. The author draws an analogy with a will, which is a promise that requires death to operate.

I was struck, again, by the layers of revelation and our human need for concrete analogies. The truth the Israelites had was a template of heaven, molded to the religious understandings of their time and region. A lot of their religions had sacrifices, but the true God said “don’t do children, do animals”. And to be mindful of the God-given life and purpose that even animal blood represents, via halal and kosher rules.

In turn that sense of evolving revelation made the final verse jump out at me, that sin has been dealt with but salvation is yet to come:

“Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.”

Verse 28

We say “I bin saved by the blood of the lamb” but we mean it prospectively. We’re looking forward to it with certainty. And meanwhile, life still often sucks.

So today I’m taking from it the strangeness and the certainty of Jesus. People who look at him sincerely find it really hard to criticise him, yet his claims are so huge. It’s really something to be both priest and sacrifice, for all time and all people. But it’s so familiar, I take it with an easy certainty which underpins my experience. Hope, as the Bible understands it.

Hebrews is an old friend, it’s great to catch up and follow these ideas through again.

Hebrews 8

Same God, different promises. Judaism in its own way is an indigenous religion, Jesus is a name of God for all the world. Jesus is God whether people know that name or not.

This book is about the Hebrews’ necessary paradigm shift to realise that their old religion is not needed any more. It’s called Hebrews, it’s for Hebrews, but it’s also very specially offensive and destructive to any desire to cling onto the old ways.

It was all there in the old testament. The guts of this chapter is a big slab of Jeremiah. In the new covenant that replaces the old covenant the law is written on our hearts, learned direct from God, not from a book, not via a random person with the role of priest.

I feel vulnerable sometimes, writing this blog, because I don’t know anything about theology, but I shouldn’t because of this chapter.

It’s so ingrained in me that salvation is a personal revelation of Jesus’ message that I can’t imagine it as an outcome of religious ritual, the way it has been for the Hebrews.

My indigenous religion is all the baggage of church culture, but also of western imperialist culture. And like any indigenous religion, it’s got a lot of truth in it, because it is a tradition of seeking God. It’s even in the light of scriptural accounts of Jesus. But it has templates for a lot of paths to salvation, of wealth, fear and power, that lead away from Jesus. Such is mankind.

I’ve started participating in message stick again, a rolling and messy discussion of Aboriginal and TSI Christianity. It’s hard work, but interesting, because it’s the perspective of Jesus, reached through an indigenous religion that isn’t Judaism or Anglicanism, which is indeed highly critical of Anglicanism, because with it came disease, violence, theft and suffering.

Somehow, the name and person of Jesus shone through that trauma as a bright beacon of hope. What more persuasive example of the power of the new covenant can you imagine?

Praying for family, a little stressed about my energy levels and things that need to be done.

Hebrews 7

We need to kill our love of human systems.

We can point to the societal influence of concepts of God, and particularly Christian concepts… The dignity of the individual, means-don’t-justify-the-ends etc. God’s systems, Jesus’system are better than human ones.. Ours are always, despite best intentions, eventually tainted by greed, selfishness, callousness etc.

We can point to that, but our bedazzlment by human systems won’t die, it’s a lifelong effort to let them go. For us, for me because I know it, to trust wholly on Jesus’ name.

For the Hebrews, in this chapter, it’s letting go of the temple, the priesthood, sacrifices, etc. All flawed, all human rituals for earning God’s grace, for being seen as spotless.

Jesus being of the order of Melchizedek means he’s the only priest needed… he doesn’t die. And he doesn’t keep doing sacrifices…. his sinless death is once for all. It’s a huge chunk of Christian theology stated concisely and memorably here. I’ve heard some of these phrases literally 1000s of times in the Anglican communion service.

The author has been weaving this exultant vision of Jesus in with warnings about falling away and the metaphor of not staying on theological milk but moving to solid food.

As I mentioned yesterday, I always assumed this Christian maturity was about leveling up the complexity. “Solid food” referred to theological-college level teaching: looking at the original Greek and being able to pronounce “melchizedek” without hesitating.

But now I’m thinking it’s more about not going backwards, purely temporal. Fighting the tendency, as Jesus was saying in the parable of the sower, for weeds to strangle or shallow soil to starve our initial perspective on the wonder of Jesus, the humble beauty of accepting God’s love.

Keeping the wonder, letting go those human systems!

Fear of the new and disregard for the old can be very human filters. I worry that the split in the Anglican church will entrench even further a denial of the human fears or disrespect we can bring to our readings of scripture.

I’m praying for more energy to attend to my own health, and the family. I’ve got checks I should do on various parts of my body… Eyes, bowel, brain, heart, knees, feet; for starters. Also: I’m doing all this paid caring for others. There’s a risk I’ll be too burnt out to care for my own.

Hebrews 6

The chapter divisions in Hebrews are, so far, annoyingly in the middle of idea flow. This chapter finishes the idea started in 5 yesterday, and half way through, switches to the idea carried on in chapter 7. Not very helpful if you’re reading a chapter a day, let alone every few days.

The material about mature vs baby Christianity, the milk vs solid food teaching metaphor, takes a more urgent turn than I expected. His point is that for grown ups, milk is a starvation diet.

As a mature-ish Christian I was most interested in him defining what counts as mature teaching. He doesn’t, though it seems the rest of the letter will at least exemplify that.

It seems like the Hebrews have heard and accepted the gospel, the news that Christ is Messiah, but there are troubling signs that it’s made little long term difference to the leaders. They’ve acknowledged that Jesus is God, but otherwise stayed comfortably culturally Jewish.

It has to transform your whole world view and speak in actions, or it’s dead. The writer is dramatic, there’s no coming back if you hear it and it makes no difference.

This feeds a larger pattern I think I’m noticing in the Bible, that hell is a teaching primarily for believers. The responsibility of being privileged to hear and believe the gospel story of Jesus is greater than much of humanity.

He hastens to add that he believes that the Hebrews are still a way off the edge of the fiery pit, but it’s a warning, a strong encouragement that the rest of the teaching will keep them edging towards the better direction, towards God.

It’s ringing in my ears a bit because our pastor likes to describe our church as “comfortably anglican”. And it’s the morning after the Anglican church in Australia dramatically split with the creation of a breakaway parallel Anglican church defined by it’s hard line stance on homosexuality.

I’m still processing that, and won’t go into it much today.

Initial impressions are that the way it’s been done is either the most careful way that concerned conservatives could have taken a stance, or a really crafty power play. Or maybe a bit of both.

How it might impact homosexual people with sincere spiritual yearnings (aka, all of them at some point), I’ve barely thought about yet. I hope the breakaways have!

But this teaching, of the necessity of Jesus transforming our cultural comfort zones, flows in surprising ways around the shape of my internal debate about it.

The rest of the chapter returns to Jesus being a high priest like Melchizedek. I think there’s a chapter and a bit to go on that, so I’ll also leave that discussion.

Except to mention that this part of the chapter has the stellar quotes. This morning I particularly appreciated:

“God wanted to make the unchanging nature of his purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised. God did this so that… we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be greatly encouraged.

“We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure”

Anchor for the soul. Unchangeable. Phew!

Care work is still ramping up, 22 hours this week, close to my aim of about 25. But not regular yet, still a lot of fill-ins. And it’s quite exhausting. But so little of the exhaustion is from work politics, so much is from the strain of meeting someone in their need. That’s refreshing.

I’ll hear whether or not I’m a candidate for the Baptist job I applied for soon, which would be much more relaxing and comfortable… as long as it’s not the path to hell.

Hebrews 5

Jesus is a great high priest in the order of Melchizedek. Sounds wonderfully ominous and pompous, as if he might be grand wizard of an exotic version of the local masonic Lodge.

How delightful then that the author explains that the good thing about priests is that they are just one of us, weak, tempted by sin, representing us before God almighty from a place of empathy, urging mercy on God’s part.

The order of Melchizedek is as much signalling Christ’s lack of credentials as his grandness. Usually priests had to be related to Aaron. Christ wasn’t, but neither was Melchizedek, who was a king who also acted in the priest role despite lacking the right bloodline. So Christ is that kind of priest, (and king).

The author of Hebrews will return to this idea in chapter 7 I believe.

But first he needs to do another grumpy tick off.

It’s a feature of Hebrews that the author seems to vacillate between extravagant articulations of God’s grace, mercy and love, and impatient bluntness about how the Hebrews aren’t good enough. The chapter ends with the author criticising them for being spiritual babies, still needing milk when they should be on solid food by now.

This makes it pretty perfect teaching for average churches today. How great it is to be in a place of solace, where you can lay all your burdens on Christ, confident of love and acceptance. But also a place of accountability, a community where there are expectations that you will challenge yourself to be a better person.

It’s a pretty helpful guide to being a support worker for disabled people, which is where I am at again after my comms job flamed out yet again.

You are there to give them dignity. To support, to lessen the impacts of their disability so that they get more equality of life choices, more life enjoyment. It’s a privileged role without the encumbrance of being medical. Not much of telling them that they should do this or should do that. Grace, empathy, acceptance.

And yet, particularly in the area of mental health, you are there to help them overcome challenges, stretch themselves, build those capacities, learn and reach goals that medical people have set for them.

So as a support worker I’m always walking the line of living in their area of chosen obedience. Not because they fear judgement, but because they are confident they are loved and accepted. They have a safe relationship where they can look at themselves and decide how they want to be a better person. Ideally, anyway. I’m a born enabler. The challenge/encouragement bit is what I find hardest.

“Let me be as Christ to you”. How deeply can I hold that in mind as I go about my support work.

Hebrews 4

I think the Hebrews who are being taught here had too small a view of Jesus. Perhaps that he was a teacher, a prophet even, who added to the teaching about God’s covenant, the promised land, the blessed state of Israel.

This view wants to get back to the blessings of the past. To return Israel to the glory as God promised it.

To get back to the state of rest in Eden, when god’s work was done, and we were God’s people.

But we go forward, not back to God’s rest. It’s about today. Jesus is higher than Moses. The promised land failed. We won’t be rebuilding the temple, Jesus is the high priest. The word of God is active now, revealing what we need to do, exposing to us our need for grace, and how we are to live. We’re building Jerusalem, heaven.

Grace is a continual updating of second chances, until the end of time. Each day is a fresh opportunity to invite god’s love into our lives and world. Today if you hear god’s voice, don’t harden your hearts.

The lord’s salvation is not in the past, it is transforming everything around us and we are part of it.

Hebrews needed a huge jolt to see this, the ongoing lordship of Christ. The chapter ends with a powerful classic statement of confident grace.

“we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”

Had a good day away visiting our friend Lisa. Feeling relaxed.

I stepped aside from my job netting a modest $700 per week. I’m doing support work again, it’s building up quite quickly, but at the moment I’m scheduled to earn a much more paltry $230 this week. I need to find another job. I’m phobic of work, it’s the last thing I prefer to do, I’d love to just stop. But this week, into job search again.

I’m taking from the passage to stay encouraged, to stay true to my values at my core, and trust that things will work out one way or another.